Socceroos promise to attack against European giants
0:47

After an encouraging display against Chile Ange Postecoglou says Australia will be all attack against Spain and the Netherlands

Fox Sports

15 Jun 2014

Sport/Football/World Cup

The Socceroos are still coming to terms with Ange Postecoglou’s revamped gameplan. Picture: George Salpigtidis.Source: News Corp Australia

THE Socceroos will get a fresh primer on the details of Ange Postecoglou’s tactical overhaul before they regroup to face The Netherlands on Thursday (EST), but even their coach admits the speed with which he has tried to instil it has been a risky project.

The Aussies must face a team that has just thrashed the world champions, after themselves going down 3-1 to Chile despite a remarkable second-half display.

Postecoglou said he would do some urgent remedial work after the dispiriting manner that Australia conceded two early goals, but admitted that his “crash course” for the players had always carried a dangerous side.

He will also have to find a replacement for fullback Ivan Franjic after it was confirmed that the Brisbane Roar defender had torn a hamstring in Saturday’s game, though Postecoglou said all other players had emerged “sore and fatigued” but ready to go again against Holland.

“There is tactical stuff - both goals were preventable and the second in particular came from a tactical error we’d spoken about before the game,” Postecoglou said.

“There’s specifics there we need to get right, but without making excuses, this has been a crash course for a lot of those players. For all the talk about the things I’ve changed, probably the biggest has been the way we play.

“That requires the players to take on a whole different approach, a different mentality. It was almost like we crammed for the exam the night before but missed a couple of the details.

Socceroos' put up gallant fight against Chile
2:07

The Socceroos play out a stunning second half performance after two early goals to Chile narrowly missing out on a deserved share of the points

Fox Sports

14 Jun 2014

Sport/Football/World Cup

“It sounds in retrospect like I’m being smart but I’ve believed all along that I haven’t set out a false sense of bravado just to get people up. I believe in Australian footballers and in a certain type of football that can compete against the very best.

“At the moment we’re still improving that, but I felt with that belief we could surprise teams.”

Postecoglu was speaking hours after FFA CEO David Gallop made the point that “brave defeats” were not a long-term goal, and the national coach said the failure to secure a positive result had made the experience all the more galling.

“I’m not one to be happy about brave defeats and it’s a results-based business,” he said. “We never said this World Cup was about anything other than results and we won’t shy away from that, even while taking a long-term view on many decisions.

“We went out to win a game of football, not damage limitation or giving guys experience. We wanted to win and believed we could. Two-nil down after 15 minutes, if there was ever going to be an exercise in damage limitation it was then but we didn’t do that.

“We started poorly and they started well, and there maybe periods like that in all our games. It was compounded by two preventable goals.

“But after that we played really well, dominated in parts and made them really struggle. At the end you’ve lost a game of football we felt we could have got something out of.”